The fundraising film presents a series of heartfelt testimonials from families, volunteers, and staff about the Ronald McDonald House in North Carolina. Speakers describe what "home" means to them and how the House serves as a "home away from home" for families coping with a child's serious illness. The narrative highlights the House’s family‑centered philosophy—providing lodging, meals, and emotional support so parents can focus on their sick child—through personal stories such as a family dealing with a rare stage‑4 brain tumor and the practical comforts like nightly dinner and weekend brunch. Volunteers, including a Duke University quarterback and thousands of community members, are portrayed as the “magic” that sustains the House, creating a supportive community where families find relief, camaraderie, and hope. The film’s purpose is to illustrate the profound impact of the House and to encourage donations to sustain its services.
Chapters
What I like most about home. Home is where I sleep. Home is my couch.
Where I feel safe.
Home is a place where I'm surrounded by people I love.
You go in and you see your child hooked to a machine and with the beeping and the lights and the no fresh air, there's no sunlight coming in and things just feel eventually like you're— they're closing in on you and you got to get outside. Coming here to Robert McDonald House gives you a nice quiet place to get your mind back to normal.
But it's not just about taking care of the child, it's about taking care of the entire family.
I'm home away from home.
Our houses are built on the simple idea that a family should focus on their child when they're sick, not where they're going to stay, not where are they going to eat, not where they're going to lay their head, but on their child.
I stay in room 166.
We found out that he had a pineoblastoma, stage 4 brain tumor, which is very rare. He had brain surgery. We couldn't afford to stay in a hotel. We slept in the waiting rooms of the hospital for 2 months before we found the Ronald McDonald House.
It's really nice over there. They fix dinner every evening at 6 o'clock, and then on the weekends they have brunch.
When he's here in the hospital, he misses the Ronald McDonald House. It changed our whole world.
All of those people usually come from very far away and need a place to stay and need to have someplace they can feel like is home, and their meals are provided. It's kind of a big cocoon that comes and wraps around them.
1, 2, 3, pick straight up. I do see magic here every day, and the strength of that magic, I think, is the volunteers.
I play for Duke University, quarterback, and I'm volunteering at the Ronald McDonald House.
Thousands upon thousands of volunteers bring their strength and And 45!
And 45!
We meet families who are really going through some incredibly difficult times of their lives. Very quickly they learn from the other families, from the community of support. There are just so many miracles that take place here every day. It's a remarkable place to be a part of, and everybody who works here feels blessed to be a part of it. of it, and I think anybody who walks through the doors can feel it.
Everybody in the house, we all pull together and try to be a family because we're away from our families being here. There's nothing like walking out of a hospital and not taking your babies with you. It's like leaving your heart in the hospital because your kids are your heart. It's nice to know you have a place to go after being at the hospital for hours on end and coming back and being able just to crash. It really is, it's a home away from home.
When you change a child's life, You change a family.
Which can change a community. And ultimately the world! Yay!
